'French Policy Towards Turkey To Change After Elections'

It is not in interest of both Socialists and the Union for a Popular Movement [UMP] to be against Turkey’s EU membership, Bagis says.

France’s policy toward Turkey’s EU accession process will change regardless of the second round of the country’s presidential elections, European Union Minister Egemen Bagıs said yesterday.

“It is not in the interest of both the Socialists and the Union for a Popular Movement [UMP] to be against Turkey’s EU membership, but it is against France’s national interest to be against Turkey’s EU membership with such strong language,” Bagıs told journalists in a press conference in Istanbul.

“All the words said during the election period, including [Nicolas] Sarkozy’s attempts to visit the so-called [Armenian] genocide monument [for the] first time in French history at the presidential level. All these are efforts at political exploitation, all these will be left behind after the elections,” Bagıs said.